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Rolling into the big 002… have the jitters shaken off… we might not remember because there were more adult beverages served… you tell us!
In this episode 2.5 (mistakes were made), we bounce around as usual with some random stories including the story behind the “Jimi Hendrix esta muerto” jam. That takes us into discussing how Ramon is a bad fan plus mixtapes and CDs.
The conversation somehow leads to topics, such as, movie remakes and Google fucking up your ability to tell a good story. Then Ramon, and Ramon alone, tells us his theory on cholo life insurance.
We round out this episode discussing the delicate topic of women in the workplace. Yeah… someone went there.
Thanks for listening and stay tuned…
El primo Neto was dating a girl whose family owned a movie rental store; he introduced us to movie magic.
So, we received this great post from some that could not post, because of technical difficulties with the site. Posting it for them:
“Dear Chicano Shuffle,
I am writing you this strongly worded letter in response to Episode 2 in the hopes of enlightening you on an important woman’s issue, the gender pay gap.
You asked for unbiased statistics from an impartial source. Based on analysis of the wages earned by over 15 million Americans between 2008 to 2012 a recent Time analysis summarizes the data from the U.S. Census and other sources: “Women earn less than men at every age range: 15% less at ages 22 to 25 and a staggering 38% less at ages 51 to 64.” How that for statistical evidence?
Now depending on what you read, women get paid less for a variety of reasons:
• Have kids.
• Interrupt their careers for their families.
• Don’t have the right education (e.g., math and science), so they can’t get good jobs.
• Are nurturing, so they don’t negotiate hard for equal pay.
• Don’t like to argue.
• Lack confidence.
• The list goes on
In the interest of time, let’s take on your argument about the limited number of opportunities available for women. The problem with this argument is that it places the blame on women for not pursuing these jobs or fields. However, it fails to explain why in industries (tech, medicine, finance, literally almost any other industry) where women and men are performing the same job, women still get paid less.
So fine, you’ll think it a matter of education, women simply aren’t prepared to take on these jobs. In a 2013 report the White House Council of Economic Advisors demonstrates that women were 21% more likely than men to be college graduates and 48% more likely to hold a graduate degree yet we continue to collectively earn 78 cents to every dollar a man earns. The gap is even greater among minority women, particularly Hispanic women who only earn 56 cents to the dollar.
Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg (NOTRIOUS R.B.G.!!) addressed this just this past week when she met with the incoming class of law students at Harvard Law (where, btw, women make up the majority of the class) and believes that while women no longer face “overt barriers” that openly discriminate against us, we do continue to face challenges that are more difficult to identify, calling these challenges an “unconscious bias”. She was recalling a case where women were given fewer opportunities to advance in management jobs bc the interviewers were white men and when interviewing candidates for promotion they were more likely to promote those candidates that they were more familiar with or more comfortable with, aka other men.
Don’t believe me? Consider Hillary Clinton. In my opinion, it is the clearest example of “unconscious bias”. There has never been a presidential candidate with the wealth of experience she has, from being first lady and living life in the White House, to senator of New York, Secretary of State, not to mention all her other accomplishments such as being the first female partner at her first law firm in Arkansas, first female presidential nominee of a major political party, I could go on… When leaving her job as Secretary of State, she enjoyed a 69% approval rating. Think about that, 7 out of 10 people approved of her performance, believed her to be competent and successful in her role. In her book, “What Happened”, she tries to rationalize about what changed between the transition from Secretary of State to presidential nominee. Among several things, she believes that she is rated better when she is in a more traditional female role supporting others. When she asks for a promotion (in this case running for President) all of a sudden, she’s not competent, she’s not presidential material, and clearly it’s not a role we associate with women. She doesn’t look like any presidential candidate we’ve ever seen, she doesn’t sound like one and we don’t see women in positions to lead. In Clinton’s case, and I am sure a lot of other women, when we strive to break through glass ceilings we are accused of being bossy entitled bitches that don’t know what we’re doing despite the fact that we have to work twice as hard as our colleagues to even be allowed to play. You may not like her, but really stop to think about why. Girl was legit best prepared human to ever take on this role. We took the person who has been preparing FOREVAH and literally nominated a non-sentient stale Cheeto someone found under a couch.
All this to say, the gender pay gap exists and is very real. And there is a litany of reasons that try to explain why it happens, most of which coincidentally lay the blame on women, but I believe that it happens bc employers can get away with it. Employers make hiring decisions, who they hire and how much they’ll pay. They balance budgets and write out paychecks. Employers continue to choose to pay less for women. As this situation becomes better recognized we will continue to see legislation such as the one signed by Obama in 2009, the Lily Ledbetter Act, which seeks to prohibit wage gaps based on gender. We will, hopefully, count on the men in our lives using their male privilege to recognize it and call it out. That’s you guys.
Long time listener,
Woman with thoughts and opinions that hasn’t reached 6 figures yet”